Prosecution Appeals Suspended Sentence of Dissident Professor
SEOUL, July 22 (Yonhap) -- The South Korean prosecution appealed Thursday to the nation's highest court a case involving a dissident South Korean-German professor suspected of violating the nation's anti-communist law.
"The prosecutors have reached a consensus that we cannot accept the appellate court's decision to dismiss charges (against Song Doo-yul) for joining the North Korean party's Politburo and paying a visit to the late North Korean leader Kim Il-sung's funeral," said Boo Bong-hoon, a senior prosecutor at the Seoul High Public Prosecutors' Office. "We submitted the appeal to the Supreme Court this afternoon." The prosecution will additionally send written reasons for the appeal, the prosecutor said.
The appeal follows Wednesday's decision by the Seoul High Court to free Song, citing lack of evidence to prove his membership in the powerful Politburo of the North Korean Workers' Party.
The court had also reduced his sentence to a suspended imprisonment of three years from the previous seven years handed down by a Seoul district court in March for violating the National Security Law with frequent visits to the communist state and pro-Pyongyang activities.
Song returned to Seoul in September 2003, after 35 years of exile in Germany. The naturalized German professor had previously tried to return to his native country, but was prevented by the nation's immigration office for his pro-North Korea activities abroad.